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New Google Algorithm Update on 9/2

Sep 04, 2016

The suspected, new Google algorithm update on 9/2 has been quite fascinating. It’s been a bit confusing to sift through all the data. At the same time we saw a change in organic position rankings, we also saw a shake-up of Google places. Preliminarily, it feels like some sort of Penguin related update.

1 client who we monitor – that had negative SEO attacks – went down in rankings. The keywords they went down in rankings for — were the exact keywords – targeted by the negative SEO anchor texts. Besides those 3-6 keywords, all other rankings for the client either remained the same, or went up in some cases!

In terms of Google places, we observed a very weird shakeup. 1 of our clients had a duplicate listing created by a previous vendor. That listing has not ranked for several years. In what is, a bizarre turn of events — for some keywords, the “old abandoned,” listing appears in places. Yet, for other keywords the “active/previously 100% ranking” Google places listing appears.

Depending on what keywords you type – 1 or the other listing appears. We’re not sure if this is tied to simply the algorithm update not being fully done yet, or perhaps a glitch. If you’re experiencing a similar issue – then we’d love to hear from you

What we’re doing: As of right now – we’re trying to reclaim that abandoned listing in order to take it over, revamp it, and if needed – make it the new “central listing.” It’s going to be a huge issue, since it has little to no reviews on it. This is a huge business issue – but rather than complain we’re just going to go with the punches.

If you’re an attorney whose facing the same issue – we feel this is a very reasonable course of action. Take control of that abandoned listing. Then try to either petition Google to merge it, or perhaps just spruce it up enough so that it doesn’t harm your business. At a later point, ask Google to merge them together perhaps.

What’s the deal with the organic algorithm update?

From what we can observe, this algorithm update seems to be about more than just penguin. The algorithm update seems to have finished rolling out (as of 9/4). Rankings, and the people who are ranking, seem to be the same as 9/3 – more or less. One client who was hit by a Panda update, did not see his rankings change – so we suspect there is no Panda element in this update.